Month: September 2015

Patrick Drazan. ‘War is Stupid: War and Anti-War Themes in Anime’ in ANIME EXPLOSION! THE WHAT? WHY? & WOW! OF JAPANESE ANIMATION. Stone Bridge Press. Berkeley. 2003. pp. 192-207

 

In brief, the article introduces the plots and analyzes the features of several representative Japanese animated films which tell different stories about both fictional and real wars that Japan was involved. As the author indicates at the beginning, these are two major kinds of animated war films in Japan (except those have no connection to the Earth). The gravestone of fireflies screened this week belongs to the real one. But however, in my own opinions on the film, how real or completed it is, in terms of reflecting the war?

 

“September 21, 1945. That was the night I died”. Such heart-breaking words spoken by a 14-year-old boy, as well as the every single piece of the film which constructs a desperate, miserable atmosphere for audiences. As a piece of Art I can’t find any moment in this film that I don’t appreciate or enjoy. Two young lives are struggling to survive is a great perspective and the scene of fireflies flying in their shelter and the boy burned his sister at the end is brilliantly drawn. And I have to say, it is, indeed, an anti-war film because just watching it you will find yourself more hating war than ever. But however, war is complicated. As the author points out, ‘It is difficult to see issues such as Japanese war guilty or atrocities In Asia and Pacific could be introduced as anything other than an artificial and ideological driven digression from the stories these films are trying to tell’(p. 194). Almost all real war films introduced in the article focus on the terrible situations inside Japan and describe Japan as the biggest victim of the war and only based on this point, they reflect the WW2. Therefore, I think this reflection is not completed. If it is not completed, how cloud it be true and real?

Scene 1:

Starting with a close up of his phone ringing, and the man wakes up in his room and answers the call. But he realizes the fact he is not able to speak any more. He goes to bath room, washes his face to make sure it is not a dream and drinks lots of water, but it doesn’t help. This scene will end with an extreme close up of his helpless face and the subtitle shows up.

 

Scene 2:

Just before the camera changes to next location, the sound of it comes out first when the picture is still the helpless face of the man (or the subtitle). Then go to the next scene which the man is running on the street to find the doctor. This scene won’t be long, it will end with the man runs into a building (a hospital or clinic).

 

Scene 3:

The scene starts with the close up of the man writing what happened to him on a paper by his hand. Then the doctor reads it and explain what the problem is, suggesting he should go to find friends for help. The scene also ends up with subtitles reflecting the man’s thinking.

 

Scene 4:

The man is waiting in his place and then opens the door for his friends coming to help him. This scene is basically about his friends comforting him. And after his friends gone, it is late and he feels a little bit better, then goes to bed.

 

Scene 5:

At the morning, the phone rings again and he answers it. It is a call of his friend asking if he is ok now. He says ‘I think so’ and suddenly finds he is able to speak again. He seems really happy and says ‘Thank you my friend’. The film also ends up here with subtitle ‘Thank you’.

I decide to make a drama as my short film project for this semester, and I expect it to be about 5-7 minutes long. It will have about 4 characters and be filmed in three different locations.

 

The plot:

A man wakes up and finds he is not able to speak; He is so nervous and looking for help from everyone he knows; the doctor says you lost your language because the loneliness in your heart; After being helped by so people he knows, he still can’t speak but doesn’t feel that nervous anymore; he go to bed at that night; when tomorrow he wakes up, he is able to speak again.

 

So the 4 characters are the man, two of his friends and the doctor. The locations should be his home, his friend’s place and the doctor’s office. Also, there might be several shots of the man walking on street as montage and transition between moving from his place to his friend’s.

 

Objective:

What I want to express by this short film, is when you feel alone, disappointed or helpless and do not know how to handle the pressure in your heart, do not just repress this emotion. Otherwise, you might finally be like the man who is not able to ‘speak’. The solution is to share it with your friends and look for others’ helps. I think I’m inspired by the fact that nowadays, due to the extensive use of Internet and heavy pressures caused by work and study, people sometimes seem indifferent and spend less time with their friends in real life and families.

 

Approach:

The first thing I want to make sure is the narrative is clear and logical enough for audience to understand what I’m talking about. I don’t want to make it too abstract like an experimental or poetic film. Therefore the way of storytelling, shooting and editing will not be so different and special.

 

However, I do want to try something different in this project. For example, to emphasize that the man is not able to speak and feels alone, I want to use subtitles with pure color background to show what he thinks and wants to say in his mind, just like the silent films have done before.

 

Here is an example of it, in film sunrise a song of two humans, the director used this approach to make a silent film such emotional and moving.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GnLVMREVA6M

 

But this approach will be only used for the man, not every character in the film. Everyone except him is speaking, to emphasize how different he is.

Location: A high school classroom

Characters: Students and teacher

 

Approach: The content of documentary will be some students having class in school. There is no voice over and interview of anyone. The way to present it is using camera shooting different students, focusing on their behaviors and reflections on the teacher’s words. Specifically, we can use their first points of view, by the camera, to achieve some certain effects like the person is concentrating on studying, or doing some other things he likes and how he manages to do this without having the attention of the teacher. Similarly, there is also the first point of view of the teacher, to see what the class is doing, from his perspective, and the reactions of his students on the things he is trying to teach them. And when changing between these points of view, the camera also need to shoot establishing shots of the whole classroom, long shots including more than one person, medium shots from different perspective and sometime medium or even extreme close up on the person whom will be used as the first point of view next. Through this device, I think the documentary will be able to show how a daily high school class runs, from a perspective which we don’t usually see. However, there will be no clear narrative, but the footage will be edited according to the logical connection between them, in order to make the film not too abstract for audiences. In sum, I want to do a documentary which the priority task of it is observing the reality happening in our lives.

I want to continue my research on the blurred ‘line’ between fictional and documentary film. But just to clarify, I’m clear about that this topic is not the focus of this course, and I think the purpose of discussing the differences and similarities between two kinds of films is to  encourage us to understand the both features of  them and decide which of them we want to involve in our own project. I have decided and believe a drama is what I want to make in this semester.

So here I have two specific films I want to discuss, one is an animated documentary the Waltz with Bashir, and another is the Nanook of the North. 

According to Betsy A. McLane in his book < A New History of Documentary Film>, the main characteristics that most documentary have in common, which are distinct from other types of cinema especially fiction film, are ‘Subjects and ideologies; purpose, viewpoints or approaches; forms; production method and techniques; and sort of experience they offer audiences, including actions that result from films’ (McLane, 2013). These characteristics picture an ideal form of documentary film, and also suggest the major differences between a traditional documentary and a fiction film. However, are they really sufficient to distinguish contemporary fiction and documentary films, especially those exist on the boundary or grey zone?

How much does the Waltz with Bashir meet these characteristics? The subjects in this film are apparently the director, his comrades and their lost memories during the 1982 Lebanon War. The purpose is considered as through retracing the fragments of their memories, to reveal the humanity in the war and the cruelty of the massacre. The point of views are himself and his comrades, but no one from another side or even the commander of Israel Army at that time. For the form and techniques of the film, it is remarkable to make the whole documentary (except the ending back to the reality) animated. This experiment means the total re-creation of the reality, which apparently challenge the traditional concept of documentary filmmaking. However, there is no convincing theory that argues a documentary cannot be animated, so it could also be considered as an acceptable re-creation of reality rather than fictional creation. But in most re-created documentaries, evidence like tape, photos and historical materials are essential to support the suggested truth. For example, in the Battle 360 series made by History Channel (Elliott, 2008), it is impossible to find actual footages which cover every single battle in WW2. So they use animation to re-create the key moments in the battlefields with the testimonies of the still alive veterans and photos shot by war correspondent to ensure the truth is reliable. But in the Waltz with Bashir, there is no guarantee on the reliability of the testimonies, but too many artistic and dramatic re-creation involved. As a result, it does have some of the characteristic, but also miss many.

And what about the Nanook of the North? Apparently, the subject is those Inuit lived in the northern Canada. The purpose is also obvious. The director was meant to show audience the primitive life of Eskimos. But here the question comes: was he more willing to show the Inuit primitive life which he thought it should be, or the actual life they were living at that time? In fact, the main viewpoints in this film, Nanook and his family are fictional character, which means the film can also be considered as an artistic re-creation. But does it mean this re-creation make the film all fictional and not a documentary? Some fictional elements may not totally deny the truth of the film. Not all the habits and customs in the film are made up by the director’s imagination. The man played Nanook was Allakariallak, an actual skillful hunter in Inuit tribute, and most characters in the film are Inuit living in the north (7), which does increase the realness to some extent. In terms of the techniques and form of the film, Nanook of the North as a silent, black-white film successfully uses subtitles to make up the lack of expressive force, and the fluent editing with skilled use of camera makes it an influential film at the early age of cinema. Again, it matches some characteristics that a traditional documentary should have, but also miss some of them. Therefore, it seems making a long list of the common characteristics that a documentary should have and compare them one by one with the film to figure out whether it is a documentary or fiction, is not a practical method to make a distinction, because as mentioned above, the hybrids always meet some but miss some.

 

 

Elliott, S., 2008. A Series and Its Sponsor Capture a Shared Link With History. [Online] Available at: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/29/business/media/29adco.html?_r=0

McLane, Betsy A. 2013, A New History of Documentary Film, e-book,  <http://RMIT.eblib.com.au/patron/FullRecord.aspx?p=1190703>.